ICFM webinar 2.0, focusing on The Flood Challenge to Resilience, was livestreamed on Thursday, August 27th，2020. It provided relevant discussion on current flooding in China, Japan and the US.

Floods are becoming more common across the vast geography of the World. The flooding this year is setting new standard in frequency and severity. For example, China is currently facing the worst flooding in last 30 years; Japan is dealing with the highest death toll caused by rainfall in more than three decades; in Michigan (USA) thousands people are evacuated after 'catastrophic' dam failures;… 

Coastal flooding, river flooding, and surge flooding are impacting onshore and offshore communities everywhere. Changes to geographic regions, once sparsely populated and now filled with growing cities, mean new communities are at increasing risk from today's extreme weather events. Very often, the affected population relies on three critical factors: the government's ability to ensure adequate loss prevention, the building of physically resilient structures, and the implementation of forward-looking municipal planning (e.g., flood maps, flood plain management, etc.). To truly foster a culture of preparedness we must go beyond traditional programs by engaging stakeholders at the federal, state, local, territorial, and private level. Recovery actions will play a role in helping communities get back on their feet, but the building of resilient communities will ultimately help mitigate the damages and aid in the recovery process. The time for higher resiliency—is now.

Interviews/Presentations

• Why has 2020 flooding been so severe in China？
• 2020 Kyushu (Japan) floods
• Michigan (USA) flooding of 2020 and dam failures

Distinguished Panelists

Interviewer

• Slobodan P. Simonovic - Water Resources Specialist, ICFM Chairperson, Institute for Catastrophic Loss Reduction, Western University, Canada

Interviewees

• Jun XIA - Professor, Academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Director, Research Institute for Water Security, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China
• Toshio KOIKE - Professor, International Centre for Water Hazard and Risk Management, Tsukuba, Japan
• Molly FINSTER - Ph.D., Decision and Infrastructure Sciences, Argonne National Laboratory, US Department of Energy, Argonne, Illinois, USA
• Carol FREEMAN - Senior Emergency Preparedness and Resilience Analyst, Decision and Infrastructure Sciences, Argonne National Laboratory, US Department of Energy, Argonne, Illinois, USA

 

 

Presentations can be accessed here:

• Prof. Slobodan P. Simonovic
• Prof. Jun XIA
• Prof. Toshio KOIKE
• Ph.D. Molly FINSTER and Carol FREEMAN

 

Moderator: Zhang Cheng, Chairperson of the Permanent ICFM Secretariat, IWHR.  
Technical support: Medcon Conference Service Platform (MEDCON)

365 participants attended the webinar from all over the world. Thank you for your interest and we hope that you will join our future online events and conferences.